rdfreak | hmmm, poor me! :)

So Friday night I discovered a probable splinter in my thumb, but I made the mistake of not doing anything about it for fear of pushing it in further. By Sat morning however, my thumb had swollen and it was very painful and I could not feel the splinter. -- I did go to the chemist though and was let in before it opened. the pharmacist had a look and suggested I salt water it to see if that draws it out first as he didn't want to dig around in there if he could avoid it.
So yesterday when I came home I put my thumb in hot salt water, and Nan (who was here for a while) went and got some Vase ointment for me; so I then put some of that on a bandaid and put it around said thumb.
This morning, much to my relief, I hope, the swelling seems to have gone down and it doesn't seem painful at all. But I shall take myself off to the chemist soon to get someone to make sure, preferably said pharmacist again as he knew how it looked yesterday.
Apart from that drama, I went to VA's technology expo Friday, and then for a bit yesterday as I didn't get around to everything I'd wanted Friday. It was very good! I saw heaps of people there I hadn't seen for years; old friends, acquaintances and teachers; was so good catching up with everyone. But I guess the most interesting bit of technology I saw was the new generation of Perkins brailler; I'd heard about this before on a C-Sun pod cast years ago so was delighted to be able to finally look at one. It was entirely made of plastic so therefore, a lot lighter. It was smaller and the carriage and margins were in a different place. Also, it was interesting to note the carriage had an erase button on it which obviously just rubbed unwanted characters out; that was pretty cool! :)
Friday afo I did that experiment for the PHD student on tactile drawings. It's a concept which I heard of in the past in terms of a possibility for us, at least in the case of having vibrations feedback to our fingers when feeling the screen with pictures.
There was basically a touch screen and Chatai used both sound (musical notes) and tactile (the vibrations) to show me shapes on the touch screen. -- For the tactile part I had a wire attached to each index finger, and for the audio, I had headphones. -- After his demonstrating each for about half an hour, I was then asked to try and distinguish the shapes using first the audio option and then the tactile one. I wasn't very good as I knew I wouldn't be but apparently I did get a few shapes though; it was more of a fluke though. -- In the end, I told him that although the audio was good in that the different notes helped me to differentiate between the shapes, I thought the tactile was a tad more readable, but not much by any means. -- I certainly couldn't rely on this technology and I don't think I'd care too. I'm blind, I’m use to my world that doesn't involve pictures; have never known any different anyway. -- I was just thinking then however, i guess where I may benefit from it is if I was wanting to do I.T work and having to learn what the Windows environment looks like on the screen; cos I still have absolutely no idea at all.
Anyway I got 20 bucks so that was worth it. -- Got a free ride home with Matt and Mick so that was nice.
OK think I ought to wander up to chemist now.
Til Next time, RdFreak

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Hi, Rachel! The subject line above probably sounds rather weird, but it concerns the things you wrote abgout in this here entry. The "ouch" refers to the splinter in your finger: what a relief that the swelling went down after a while, and I very much hope that the splinter has gone now. The "wow" refers to all the accessible stuff you mentioned: I'd never heard anything about this new version of the Perkins Brailler till you wrote about it here, and it sounds heaps better than the old-fashioned one I still have, plus those different ways of presenting pictures sound interesting, although seeing them through musical notes sounds rather odd compared to being able to feel the shapes which appear in the pictures.

Re the splinter, thanks. Off to the doc later to get my ears cleaned out, so I will confirm with him as I didn't end up going to the chemist yesterday since I was quite happy with the no-pain deal in my thumb.
Re the brailler, yes, I did like it, but, and even though it caused me much grief at school having to carry the heavy thing from one end to the other at our period change, I think I like the original one. Mine is in bad need of a service so must get on to that.
And yeh, the musical drawing was def weird and something I don't think could ever work really; the vibrations on the other hand, maybe.
I shall put you on my trusted filter today Clare, not that I use it a lot though.

hmmm, poor me! :)

Ouch and wow!

Re: Ouch and wow!